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India has an enormous wealth of literary talent. Among post-colonial writers who make their home in India, are the two Vikrams: Vikram Seth and Vikram Chandra, both of whom have distinguished themselves on the literary scene.
Expatriate Indian writers have also given us a treasure trove of material which covers a diversity of subjects and locales. Award winning fiction penned by the likes of Jhumpa Lahiri, Salman Rushdie and our Canadian Governor-General Award winner Rohinton Mistry, weave tales which linger in the mind long after one reads the last sentence on the final page. There are books which shrink the past and carry us through India's chequered history. Travellers' yarns allow us to accompany those who choose to cross the sub-continent on trains, buses, bicycles and camels. (Yes camels!)
Our Anglo-Indian writers, too, have carved out a niche. Ruskin Bond, winner of the highest literary honour in India, the Padma Shree, takes his stand on the topmost tier. Nudging his elbow is Allan Sealy, another writer whose fiction has won wide acclaim both in India and overseas. Hugh and Colleen Gantzer are prolific travel scribes, and continue to engross readers with fresh and lively accounts of excursions throughout India. Australian citizens, Eric Strachey, Gloria Jean Moore and Esther Mary Lyons have joined the ranks of Anglo-Indian literary luminaries with their stories of family history and life in India.
This section will include thumbnail reviews of books and films (not the Bollywood variety!) on India, categorised under subject headings, and will be updated over the next several months.
Do return for a browse through the contents.
Whether written during the "Raj" era (Paul Scott, Rumer Godden, M.M. Kaye) or about contemporary India, (Naipaul, Arundhati Roy) these are books which I hope will send you scrambling to the nearest library, or bookstore. Some of them, unfortunately, are only sold in India (Penguin, India), but I will include the name of retail outlets in India, which might be able to assist you if you'd like to acquire them. I will also include, wherever possible, the ISBN numbers which might be useful in tracking these books down.
For starters, I am posting two articles, both of which are interviews with writers whom I was privileged to meet during my trips to India and Britain in the late 1990's. Ruskin Bond was the most kindly of hosts when I chatted to him in Mussoorie in 1998 and again in 2001. Hazel Innes-Craig ("Under the Old School Topee") treated me to a wonderful curry and rice lunch at her lovely home at Ricksmansworth and talked about her fascination for India and the process of research which resulted in the final version of her book.
Do come back soon. India, awaits you within the pages of books and across the movie screen: a feast of wonder, nostalgia and delight.
Margaret
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